Post by Ratsnake Games in Suggestion about AI games. - itch.io

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Ratsnake Games10 days ago(+8)

If you use AI only for some specific things rather than for everything, that is not a "grey area". The question "Do you use AI or not" is very simple to answer, and in your case the answer is "yes". If you feel offended by the idea that your game is labelled as using AI, you probably should not be using AI.

The thing with AI is that a lot of people want to argue that their way of using it, or the area where they are using it, is perfectly fine. I disagree, and as a consumer (for whose benefit this disclosure exists), my definition of the word "using" is in line with the one provided in the OED, not with whatever definition you want to come up with so you can carve out an exception for yourself.

In another thread, you argue that you just use AI for generating pixel art (where I do not see why that is fundamentally different from using it for any other kind of art, unless you think that pixel art is "lesser" and stealing it is therefor more morally acceptable) and for animating your own art (where you are still using a machine that steals from every animator on the planet in order to make something you are not able to do yourself). I absolutely reject the idea that these usecases are somehow more okay than other uses of generative AI models trained on stolen content. Plus, copyright infringement is not the only concern around AI; artistic integrity and quality are also of note. I do not believe AI animation is good, and I do not want to be tricked into buying AI animations believing they are made by humans.

If itch.io ever allows creators to claim they haven't used AI when in fact they have, I would stop buying anything on this platform. Period. Requiring vendors to be truthful in their product descriptions is the literal bare minimum for a usable marketplace, and allowing creators to lie because telling the truth might hurt their sales numbers, their reputation or their ego is flat-out unacceptable.

I really do not understand why this is so hard to grasp for some people.

Melinda242410 days ago (1 edit) (+1)

I think you're misrepresenting what I said; I would never approve of deceiving people; quite the opposite—the idea is to make it clearer how AI was used. Obviously, using it for animation isn’t the same as using it to generate an image or video, and honestly, I don’t think pixel art is inferior, but since it’s art made with pixels, it’s more limited, and that makes it harder to have a recognizable style in small works. As sad as that sounds, it’s a reality.

I'm sure I could show you any 48x48 pixel art from anywhere in the world, and you wouldn't be able to tell who made it.

Ratsnake Games10 days ago(+3)

You want to label your game that was made using AI as being made without using AI, because according to your judgement you didn't use it all that much. That's deceptive. Sorry.

"I don’t think pixel art is inferior, but since it’s art made with pixels, it’s more limited, and that makes it harder to have a recognizable style in small works. As sad as that sounds, it’s a reality.

I'm sure I could show you any 48x48 pixel art from anywhere in the world, and you wouldn't be able to tell who made it."

That doesn't make it more acceptable to plagiarize it.

Melinda242410 days ago(+1)

Actually, I was referring to classifying it as “intermediate use” or something like that. Modifying your own work isn't the same as stealing someone else's. If you're telling me I can't feed my work into AI to have it animated, it's as if you're claiming rights over my work and my methods. Of course I have the right to modify my own work using AI without anyone accusing me of stealing it.

Ratsnake Games10 days ago(+1)

If you put your own work into generative AI and have it modify it, what comes out is a hybrid of your art and the many, many stolen pieces of art that were used to train the AI. That's a fact. That's how the AI works. The thing that comes out of it is NOT your work.

You have the right to modify your own work, but if you modify your work by blending it with stolen stuff, then the result is a derivative of this stolen stuff. And you do not, in fact, have a right to do that without being accused of stealing.

Melinda242410 days ago(+2)

To put it simply, when I use AI to animate my illustrations, you're calling me a thief for “stealing” my own work.

Ratsnake Games10 days ago(+2)

No, I'm calling you a thief for stealing the work of the others whose work your AI input is blended with.

Melinda242410 days ago(+2)

That just goes to show you don't understand what it means to animate something: it means giving it movement. Would I have to ask God for a copyright for inventing things that move?

Ratsnake Games10 days ago(+1)

I understand just fine what animating something means: It means creating a bunch of similar images that are played in fast succession to create the illusion of movement. I literally did that yesterday.

If you don't make the animation, you don't own the animation. Simple as that. And no amount of obfuscation or insulting me by insinuating I do not know what words mean is going to change that.

Melinda242410 days ago(+2)

Man, I'm telling you that illustration is mine... there's no way I'm stealing from myself.

Ratsnake Games10 days ago (1 edit) (+1)

The illustration you are feeding into the AI is. The animation that comes out of the AI is *not*. Surely you understand that an animation is a different thing from an illustration?

Also, not a man.

Melinda242410 days ago(+1)

When it comes to pixel art, it’s very simple: you can’t ban something you can’t monitor. If a piece of art doesn’t have a recognizable style, it’s impossible to determine whether it was stolen.

Ratsnake Games10 days ago(+1)

The whole AI industry runs on the principle of "you can never prove that this output stole from this specific input, so what we are doing is totes legal". It's theft that's being legalized through fancy math - which is why I reject AI models that are trained on copyrighted data without the consent of the creator as immoral outright and do not want anything to do with people who use those models.

That doesn't make it ethical to do so, which is why we have AI disclosure - so that I, as a consumer, know that you are willing to steal from others as long as you know that you can get away with it, and can then decide that I do not want anything to do with you.

Melinda242410 days ago(+1)

Let me explain with an example we can all see right here: you have a pixel art avatar of a snake. Can we recognize its style? No, you can’t prove it’s yours, but that’s not enough to make stealing it immoral. What does allow me to steal it and get away with it is that there’s no law in the world that lets you claim ownership of such a simple combination of pixels... it would be like claiming ownership of a word, or a color, or a musical note.

Ratsnake Games10 days ago(+2)

So now we've gone from "i respect pixel art and don't think of it as lesser" to "pixel art is so simplistic and stupid that it couldn't possibly be copyrightable".

You're wrong, of course, pixel art absolutely is copyrightable. I am not sure if the snippet of a larger tilesheet (from a larger game) is in itself copyrightable, but larger pieces of pixel art absolutely are. Even with mine, judgement is gonna depend a lot on legislation and on who has the better lawyer. As per ownership, I am actually pretty confident that my "paper trail" of my creative work, including aseprite files in a timestamped git repository showing my progress, would hold up to establish ownership in court. It doesn't really matter if you, personally, are able to recognize a distinct style in a work. That is not the standard the law applies to check if a work is copyrightable. I am not aware of any precedent when it comes to pixel art, but in music, landmark US cases have upheld copyright for musical motifs consisting of as little as four (that is the number that comes after three) notes because even that constitutes enough creative effort (the actual standard that is being applied) to constitute copyrightable material.

Could you get away with stealing my snake profile pic? Probably, because suing you is more trouble than it is worth. Would stealing my snake pixel art and passing it off as your own make you a thieving little asshat? Yes, absolutely. (Speaking purely in hypotheticals here, of course.)

To conclude:

* you have no clue about AI

* you have no clue about copyright

* your ethical framework consists of "if i can get away with it, it is morally acceptable"

It is pretty clear that itch.io should not take any advice from you. Now kindly stop embarrassing yourself.

Melinda242410 days ago(+1)

Of course you can claim copyright on pixel art, but only when it’s complex. Let me explain with an example—and this is something a musician friend of mine told me: in the music industry, there are certain melodies that are so simple they aren’t copyrighted. That’s what I mean.

Ratsnake Games10 days ago (1 edit) (+1)

Allow me to repeat myself:

I am not aware of any precedent when it comes to pixel art, but in music, landmark US cases have upheld copyright for musical motifs consisting of as little as four (that is the number that comes after three) notes because even that constitutes enough creative effort (the actual standard that is being applied) to constitute copyrightable material.

I would also argue that, if making pixel art doesn't take enough effort to justify copyright, surely you can just make your own without using AI. Right? You'd have to be a pretty big idiot if you need AI to generate the artistic equivalent of a single musical note.

Melinda242410 days ago(+1)

That’s very relative; there can also be combinations of many more notes that aren’t copyrighted because they’re part of a broader musical style. The point is that while it’s true we can’t allow artists’ work to be stolen, we also can’t allow an artist to misappropriate something that belongs to everyone. Disney can claim the rights to Mickey Mouse, but not to mice in general—mice belong to everyone.

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